Journal

Author Jimmy Beaulieu is a major player on the Quebec graphic novel scene. Like the other creators who star in the Maker’s Music series, he affirms that music plays an important role in his creative process. Guided by rhythm, Jimmy has no difficulty likening drawing to dance, believing that “music influences gesture”.

A couple weeks ago, fifteen representatives from Apollo Studios travelled to Cannes to attend the 62nd edition of the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity. Here’s a summary of a week that was both enriching and rewarding for our whole team.

One minivan, one year, sixteen countries, more than fourteen thousand kilometers, twenty advertising agencies, and thousands of liters of diesel fuel later, Jonay Sosa will finish his journey at Cannes on june 24th.

Barber by day and electronic music producer by night, Rob Squire’s life is surrounded by music. There’s a big difference however, in the music you’ll hear playing at his barbershop and the music he produces as a DJ. In this second episode of Makers' Music, Squire explains his relationship with music and the role that it plays in his two professions.

Recorded in our studios during free moments between sessions and late into nights after everyone else at the office had packed up and went home, Rivver (aka François Bélanger) developed his second musical work: DIMENSION. Powered by a sound that is both hypnotizing and organic, Rivver transports the listener into a bewitching and mysterious universe that the director Jeremy Comte wanted to convey (and did so brilliantly) in his music video dedicated to the abum’s first single: “Am I Ok” featuring Milk & Bone.

One of the easiest ways for us to give back to the music industry that sustains us is to open our studios up to new acts in need of recording space. When our clients have cleared out for the day, the lights often stay on to make way for talents like Milk & Bone, an up and coming electro-pop duo from Montréal who are making waves on the international scene. They are the first in our Off the Record series where we showcase the talent that records here, after dark.

We invited some agency and production folks in Toronto by our office to take the VR experience we created alongside Felix & Paul Studios for a spin. And we asked photographer Maya Fuhr to shoot their reactions.

Félix Lajeunesse and Paul Raphael (Felix & Paul Studios) have been making waves in the world of virtual reality since the release of Strangers with Patrick Watsonat SXSW last year. Since then, they have been commissioned by the likes of Samsung, Dos Equis and a major hollywood studio to bring their signature approach to the emerging medium.

We sat down in studio with Apollo Studios Montreal Creative Director, Martin Pelland, to chat about his time with indie band The Dears, the era when Montreal was first dubbed "The Next Seattle" and how the indie music industry is opening its mind to collaborations with brands.

Have you ever had to license the Happy Birthday song for one of your projects? If you have, you were probably told by someone like me that although everything indicates that this song is in the public domain, you still have to pony up a considerable amount of cash to use it.

Okay. Everybody stay calm, the phone is okay. In product experiment orchestrated by our pals at 1One Productions with agency Lg2, Michael was sent to his native Australia to purchase the phone then promptly dropped the damn thing into a pitcher of beer.